Bach the Unknown

Paper Summary:

Johann Sebastian Bach stands as the epitome of Western music. This paper explains that as a musician, Bach encompassed all of the musical styles that preceded him, such as those found in the medieval and Renaissance periods, and then rose to the highest peak of artistic and technical development beyond which it was, in many cases, impossible to go any further. The writer points out, however, that Bach also looked forward to the future of Western art and music and set the standards for the centuries to come. More conspicuously than any other composer of his day, Bach suggested and invented the technical devices and methods which, with the coming of other composers like Haydn, Mozart and Beethoven, were soon to open up new horizons for music.

From the Paper:

"His special quality had much to do with how he used the resources of art in order to apply them to new purposes. His artistic powers and insight were so much higher than those who came before him that Western music, almost at once, evolved from the simplicities of the Medieval period and into full maturity. Bach wrote a library of music that is incomparable in regard to its extensiveness and artistic merit. It is indeed curious that this uniquely productive genius who wrote so much that was touched with immortality should have been neglected for almost a century after his death in 1750."

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